Day 5 - Malota Community School

Simon says

Interactive focus group

Final day of the first week! The mammoth task of completing the sanitation questionnaire with grades 4 and 5 continued. The volunteers soon raced through it by adding their own adaptive twists. 



Focus groups on teaching styles and school enjoyment were facilitated with great success. 

We decided to trial group reading and comprehension with both classes. Some of the findings surprised us – 11 year olds struggled with the word ‘cat’ and the jump between the lower and upper grades was vast. However, what was noted was that every child reveled in the opportunity to have their individual reading resource. Debrief informed us that the volunteers found reading with the children highly rewarding and felt that the children had taken something valuable from the session. One child commented how he would practice over the weekend and return on Monday to demonstrate his new skills.

Cultural dancing

The afternoon was filled with focus groups and teaching to the mothers and elders of the wider community. We had to adjust our sails once more when Clement approached us and asked pairs of volunteers to head out into the compound to do some individual teaching in the residents’ houses. With no time for preparation the volunteers willingly took on the challenge and headed in blind with translators in tow. All volunteers reported back valuable information and we soon realised that their subjective accounts was crucial to our research. 

During debrief some of the volunteers expressed how the experience was quite harrowing and that it was evident some basic education could go a long way. Clement suggested an opportunity could arise to do outreach programmes in various compounds, incorporating music and dance. As the sun set our rhythm was tested and our hip movements mocked as we were called into a circle for cultural dancing.

Exhausted we headed back to the lodge and reflected on our week. Morale was high and a buzz of excitement was running through the volunteers as we realised that this week had begun to clear the path for a potential intervention.

The night drew in and the volunteers prepared for their safari this weekend. Have fun guys, thanks for a great week!

"We must welcome the future, remembering that soon it will be the past; and we must respect the past, remembering that it was once all that was humanly possible." George Santayana

"Progress is not accomplished in one stage." Victor Hugo (Les Miserables)